BandAids
by ArchivistGardener
Summary: Oneshot. Modern Cinderella story except Mercia isn't cinderella, she's the stepsister. Not so much a romance as about friendship, crushing, and dreams.


She was tired of wearing band-aids. Mercia couldn't understand how it happened that she always had to use so many. Band-aids were on her knees where she fell when playing ultimate Frisbee. They were on her forehead when she bumped into the door she hadn't seen around the corner. A couple of them were even on her legs where she had cut herself shaving. She was prone to accidents she supposed. She was used to it by now.

It wasn't a surprise therefore when she had to put a band-aid of sorts on her terribly broken heart.

She put it there after he had broken it – after he had walked away from her not knowing what he was doing to her. Charlie walked away to hug this cute blonde cheerleader.

He walked away to hug her sister. Or rather he walked to her step-sister, whom she loved more than anything else in the world because her step-sister understood Mercia.

Mercia's mom had married Angela's dad on a whim. She told Mercia and her older sister that he was drop dead gorgeous and had money. Mercia didn't say anything back to her mom. She had learned long ago not to argue with her. But she was left at the age of eleven wondering why they should leave her real father. After all he loved them. She could see it in his eyes when her mom drove away. She watched as those beautiful blue eyes became watery and then very dry and red. She wanted to run to him and tell her daddy that she would always be his little girl. Mercia hated her mom for those moments. Growing up in a broken home brought about by a mother's selfishness bred nothing but bitterness in Mercia's heart.

Her sister was no help at all. The fifteen year old witch of a girl was just like their mother. Liza scolded Mercia for crying in her sleep and told her to grow up. Telling her to get a grip was her favorite past time by the age of seventeen. By twenty, Liza had already been married and divorced. Her mother was proud that Liza had come out of the packed courtroom with a profit at her heartbroken lover's expense. Mercia was disgusted.

Angela's dad died when Mercia and Angela were thirteen. Angela grieved and Mercia comforted her in the best way she could. She knew what it felt like to lose a father. After that, Mercia's mother constantly degraded Angela and gave her the second best in everything. Again, Mercia was disgusted. She wanted to disown her family desperately. Once, she even considered running away. When Mercia invited Angela to join her, Angela had convinced her not to.

"Where will we go?"

"I don't know."

"I don't either. How would we survive?"

"I don't know."

"It won't work, Mercy."

"You don't have to be such a pessimist about it."

"I'd rather be an optimist about staying here."

Mercia broke down in front of Angela again. She told her that she couldn't go on living with a family she hated. She couldn't go on never being happy. Angela soothed her and asked her if she didn't make Mercia happy.

Of course Angela made her happy. She was her best friend, her confidante, and, in a way, her mother.

So she stayed. Not so much because she felt she could learn to be content with where she was or because she felt that Angela was right about being optimistic. Mercia just didn't know what she could do if she did leave right then. What was the point in leaving if she would just have to come crawling back? Besides, she wouldn't leave Angela alone with her mother. She didn't trust her not to kick her out if she could.

After all, she could leave when she went to college. At first, Mercia had had to battle her mom over going to college. Her mom was everything but medieval about the idea.

Wouldn't it be better to get married to a nice, rich man?

No it certainly wouldn't. Not in Mercia's mind anyway.

She wanted to go to college to learn and to escape. Finally, her mom agreed though it was more because she wanted her daughter to have the best in what she wanted and not because she wanted her to better herself. But as long as she was going, Mercia was happy.

She and Angela broke upon high school prepared to work their way to success from the start. Subconsciously, both of the girls knew what was at stake, even in freshman year. They took the hardest classes as the years went by and participated in all sorts of extracurricular activities. Angela was in the cheer squad and literary club. Mercia was in Model UN and cross country. They were still best friends but they began to grow apart in little ways.

Mercia knew that Angie was more popular than she was. She was perfect after all. She had that soft golden hair that fell across her shoulders beautifully and the great sense of humor to show she was actually a person and not a bimbo. There was a lot of sympathy for Angela at school; somehow, everyone knew what went on at home even though Mercia and Angela never talked about it to anyone. Angela was so nice to Mercia that her friends didn't know what to think. Mercia suspected that they thought that Angie was being the better person, which she was, but they never noticed that Mercia was just as nice to Angela. They only saw the martyr they expected to see. Angela never picked up on that; Mercia did though, but she never said anything to Angie. She knew that Angela was simply too nice to see it. Once she had hinted at it and Angela had gotten into a full scale show of righteous indignation on behalf of Mercia. All she did was rant to Mercia though. She didn't say anything to her friends, for which Mercia was grateful. It was like an unspoken rule between them: that people could think what they liked, it didn't matter at all to them. They were beyond such pettiness.

Mercia was known as the smart girl. She looked the part too. Her curly brown hair plus her wire rimmed glasses gave her the look of a cool nerd. She was accepted by her peers and they loved her. They loved that she would help them out in a tight spot with homework and that she would edit their papers before they had to turn them in. She didn't mind; the role was her little niche in school society.

When Angela and Mercia hit senior year though, Mercia began to feel a little jealousy. She couldn't stop herself and she tried to every single night. Angela was simply more well liked and more well known than Mercia. Mercia hated herself for her jealousy. Sometimes she snapped at Angela and shouted at her when she tried to help her. She always apologized afterward. Angela told her that she understood. Mercia smiled in return but knew in heart that Angela couldn't possibly understand.

The homecoming dance was the culmination of everything. Everything started at the beginning of senior year with Charlie Britain.

Charlie wasn't the most popular guy in their high school, but he wasn't nobody either. He was on the football team and everyone seemed to know who he was. He was tall and muscular with blonde hair that had the air of never being combed. With an incredible sense of humor and an overall nice guy side, he was the epitome of the perfect boyfriend to Mercia. He was sweet, funny, smart, sarcastic, fun, and very male. She loved being around him. When he chose to sit beside her in history she smiled like a fool even though she knew it was probably not because he liked her. They talked, joked, dared, challenged – they were friends, but nothing more.

She wanted more. It was the most ridiculous feeling, but she wanted to see him come toward her in the parking lot to talk to her after school, to give her a quick kiss before she went home. Mercia and Charlie just weren't that close though. If they did talk after school it wasn't for very long and it was usually about class.

Mercia took to talking about Charlie at home to Angela. She didn't tell Angela how she felt about the guy; she just talked about him. Her wonderful step-sister was regaled with tales from the day: a debate Martin and Lee had had, a story Alison had told, a joke Charlie had cracked, a mock verbal fight that Matt and Danielle had gotten into. Mercia began to notice that Angela was quiet when they talked about Charlie, that she blushed a little, that she asked strange questions.

A month or so had passed before Mercia finally figured out what was going on. How could she have not noticed when she was going through the exact same thing? Mercia's jealously escalated because she also began to notice that Charlie talked to Angela in the parking lot after school. Her chest would tighten when Angela offered to introduce her to some of Charlie's friends that we barely knew from class. That Angie knew his friends signaled greater things to come.

A constant battle was now being waged in Mercia's heart. She was jealous of Angela. She was happy that Charlie was still only friends with Angela and that he had a girlfriend who wasn't her step-sister. She hated herself for her horrible thoughts. She was hopeful when Charlie and his girlfriend finally admitted that they could only ever be friends. She was depressed when Charlie started to talk to Angela at her locker more.

Charlie still talked to Mercia. She was still the faithful helper with homework. One time, they had bumped into each other at the library and he had whipped out his English Essay and asked her to read it. She said she would. Then he broke her heart the first time.

"Angela has a facebook, doesn't she?"

"Yeah. It isn't too hard to find her."

"Thanks, I've just been busy so I thought I'd ask while I was thinking about it." He flashed her that brilliant and rueful smile before making some sarcastic remark about his paper and her grades. She couldn't quite get her mind around it though; her ears were ringing slightly.

The second time Charlie broke her heart, Angela did it for him.

"Charlie asked me to homecoming dance, Mercia. Should I say yes?"

"Duh. Why not?" Mercia smiled and rolled her eyes.

"Right." Angela smiled an unconscious satisfied smirk. Mercia wanted to slap it off her face. "Do you think we could go shopping this weekend?"

"I'll ask Mom, I'm sure I can get her to let us go." Mercia kicked herself inside; she loved Angela and she needed to stop being so childish.

"Ok."

Mercia got her mom to agree. Angela was on the queen's court that night; she wasn't elected homecoming queen, but Angie didn't mind. Mercia got the feeling somehow that Angela knew exactly what was going through her head. She saw her step-sister give a pleased sort of smile when another girl was named queen.

The dance that night was a big hit. Their high school had won, so of course everybody was happy. Mercia was trying to smile but she had a very hard time keeping it on her face when she saw Angela and Charlie kissing in the middle of the dance floor. It was too romantic and it wasn't her in his arms.

School for the next couple of weeks was filled with distraction for Mercia. Everywhere she went, Charlie and Angela seemed to be there. They talked to her and the three always had a good laugh when they did but Mercia felt a little empty.

So there she was standing in the parking lot again, just like she always did hoping Charlie would be coming to talk to her and giver her a kiss like he never was. This time he did come to her, to ask her about history homework, to challenge her on the next test. She laughed and as he walked away, her heart broke the third time.

It should be illegal for anyone to be able to hurt her this much, she thought to herself. She shouldn't have to always be hurt. But she was used to band-aids. After all, getting hurt is unavoidable when most people think you don't have feelings, when they look at you and see the ugly step-sister they expect to see.

She had cut herself shaving again. Making herself pretty hadn't worked and she just got cut because she shaved a little too close to the skin. Mercia decided as she put on some ointment that she shouldn't have to change herself to be noticed. She made up her mind as she put on yet another band-aid that losing blood was part of life.

Maybe Charlie wasn't made for her, but maybe someone else was out there and maybe he wouldn't let Mercia get hurt. Or if she did by accident or because of him, she knew that he would put her band-aids on himself. She knew that those band-aids would be the ones that really helped.

**This is yet another silly little fairy tale thing I felt like writing. Please review, I like writing little stories like this but I'd like to know what other people think. ******** Please…**


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